In the Séance Room

Lettice Galbraith

Lettice Galbraith wrote some of the finest ghost stories of the late nineteenth century, with her chilling tales of cursed buildings, vengeful spirits, and business meetings gatecrashed by satanic forces following in the eerie footsteps of authors like Mary E. Braddon and Sheridan Le Fanu. However, the writer herself remains something of a mystery. She published two story collections and a novel in 1893, and a further supernatural tale in 1897, but very few autobiographical details are known about her.

Supernatural justice is a recurring theme in her tales, with “In the Séance Room” suggesting how a medium’s talents might unmask even the most socially privileged of men. The spiritualism movement in the nineteenth century had various overlaps with social justice movements on both sides of the Atlantic, where the ability to become recognised as a medium outside of traditional establishment power structures gave a voice to many women marginalised by class or race.

“In the Séance Room” was originally published in Galbraith’s 1893 New Ghost Stories , one of the most popular anthologies of its day. Printed as a sixpenny paperback by Ward Lock and Bowden, it went through three editions in the next five years; however, it is much less well-known today than it deserves. Its stories are set in a recognisable fin-de-siècle present-day, some in London itself. “The Missing Model”, for instance, tells the tale of an artist from St. John’s Wood who finds more than he bargains for when he looks for a new sitter. “In the Séance Room”, beginning in the seemingly safe, firelit house of society doctor Valentine Burke and ending with secrets dredged from the depths of an icy Regent’s Canal, is one of the collection’s best.